Essay Questions and Related Sources
The Subversion of Gender Roles in Virginia Woolf's 'Orlando'
Essay type: Argumentative
Recommended sources
- Marcus, Jane. "Woolf and the New Age." Virginia Woolf and the Languages of Patriarchy. Indiana University Press, 1987.
- Gilbert, Sandra M., and Susan Gubar. "Sexual Linguistics: Gender, Language, Sexuality." The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination. Yale University Press, 2000.
The Evolution of the Gothic: From Horace Walpole's 'The Castle of Otranto' to Emily Brontë's 'Wuthering Heights'
Essay type: Comparative
Recommended sources
- Punter, David. The Literature of Terror: A History of Gothic Fictions from 1765 to the Present Day. Longman, 1996.
- Botting, Fred. Gothic. Routledge, 2014.
The Importance of Studying Working-Class Literature in the English Canon
Essay type: Persuasive
Recommended sources
- Fox, Pamela. Class Fictions: Shame and Resistance in the British Working-Class Novel, 1890–1945. Duke University Press, 1994.
- Kirk, John. Twentieth-Century Writing and the British Working Class. University of Wales Press, 2003.
The Role of Nature in William Wordsworth's Poetry
Essay type: Analytical
Recommended sources
- Bate, Jonathan. Romantic Ecology: Wordsworth and the Environmental Tradition. Routledge, 1991.
- Gill, Stephen. William Wordsworth: A Life. Oxford University Press, 1989.
Representations of Colonialism in Joseph Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' and Chinua Achebe's 'Things Fall Apart'
Essay type: Compare and Contrast
Recommended sources
- Said, Edward W. Culture and Imperialism. Vintage, 1994.
- Achebe, Chinua. "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness." Massachusetts Review, vol. 18, no. 4, 1977, pp. 782-794.
The Influence of the Metaphysical Poets on T.S. Eliot's Poetry
Essay type: Expository
Recommended sources
- Gardner, Helen. The Metaphysical Poets. Oxford University Press, 1967.
- Eliot, T.S. "The Metaphysical Poets." Selected Essays. Faber and Faber, 1951.
The Use of Stream of Consciousness in James Joyce's 'Ulysses'
Essay type: Critical Analysis
Recommended sources
- Ellmann, Richard. James Joyce. Oxford University Press, 1982.
- Humphrey, Robert. Stream of Consciousness in the Modern Novel. University of California Press, 1954.
The Portrayal of London in Charles Dickens' Novels
Essay type: Descriptive
Recommended sources
- Ackroyd, Peter. London: The Biography. Vintage, 2001.
- Welsh, Alexander. The City of Dickens. Oxford University Press, 1971.
The Feminist Undertones in Jane Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice'
Essay type: Argumentative
Recommended sources
- Johnson, Claudia L. Jane Austen: Women, Politics, and the Novel. University of Chicago Press, 1988.
- Butler, Marilyn. Jane Austen and the War of Ideas. Clarendon Press, 1987.
The Treatment of Madness in Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' and 'King Lear'
Essay type: Comparative
Recommended sources
- Neely, Carol Thomas. Distracted Subjects: Madness and Gender in Shakespeare and Early Modern Culture. Cornell University Press, 2004.
- Salkeld, Duncan. Madness and Drama in the Age of Shakespeare. Manchester University Press, 1993.
The Significance of the Moor in Emily Brontë's 'Wuthering Heights'
Essay type: Analytical
Recommended sources
- Gilbert, Sandra M., and Susan Gubar. The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination. Yale University Press, 2000.
- Ghnassia, Maurice. Metaphysical Rebellion in the Works of Emily Brontë. Palgrave Macmillan, 1994.
The Relevance of George Orwell's '1984' in the Age of Digital Surveillance
Essay type: Persuasive
Recommended sources
- Rodden, John. The Cambridge Companion to George Orwell. Cambridge University Press, 2007.
- Ingle, Stephen. The Social and Political Thought of George Orwell: A Reassessment. Routledge, 2006.
The Portrayal of War in Wilfred Owen's and Rupert Brooke's Poetry
Essay type: Compare and Contrast
Recommended sources
- Stallworthy, Jon. Wilfred Owen. Oxford University Press, 1974.
- Lehmann, John. The Strange Destiny of Rupert Brooke. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1980.
The Development of the English Sonnet from Wyatt to Milton
Essay type: Expository
Recommended sources
- Spiller, Michael R. G. The Development of the Sonnet: An Introduction. Routledge, 1992.
- Cousins, A. D., and Peter Howarth, editors. The Cambridge Companion to the Sonnet. Cambridge University Press, 2011.
The Role of the Supernatural in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'
Essay type: Critical Analysis
Recommended sources
- Bate, Walter Jackson. Coleridge. Harvard University Press, 1968.
- Beer, John. Coleridge's Poetic Intelligence. Palgrave Macmillan, 1977.
The Representation of Class in Charles Dickens' 'Great Expectations'
Essay type: Descriptive
Recommended sources
- Pykett, Lyn. Charles Dickens. Palgrave, 2002.
- Gilmour, Robin. The Idea of the Gentleman in the Victorian Novel. George Allen & Unwin, 1981.
The Deconstruction of the Hero in Graham Greene's 'The Quiet American'
Essay type: Argumentative
Recommended sources
- Sherry, Norman. The Life of Graham Greene: Volume 2, 1939-1955. Jonathan Cape, 1994.
- Bergonzi, Bernard. A Study in Greene: Graham Greene and the Art of the Novel. Oxford University Press, 2006.
The Use of Satire in Jonathan Swift's 'Gulliver's Travels' and George Orwell's 'Animal Farm'
Essay type: Comparative
Recommended sources
- Rawson, Claude. God, Gulliver, and Genocide: Barbarism and the European Imagination, 1492-1945. Oxford University Press, 2001.
- Rodden, John, and John Rossi. The Cambridge Introduction to George Orwell. Cambridge University Press, 2012.
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